


One day

by Tamoline



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-19
Updated: 2013-05-19
Packaged: 2017-12-12 07:33:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/808964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tamoline/pseuds/Tamoline
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha is tasked with finding Maya Hansen.</p><p>From there, it will get a lot more personal than either one of them expects.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One day

**Author's Note:**

> Vague spoilers for Iron Man 3. Extremely vague spoilers for the Avengers.

It hurts.

Everything hurts.

But what really, really hurts is the hole in her chest that *arsehole* Killian put there.

Well, that and the knowledge that she's never going to see Extremis completed, perfected.

That burns too.

Of course, there is the other choice.

The devil's choice.

The one she's always been far too sensible to take in the past.

The injector containing the ampoule of Extremis lies on the ground, inches from her face.

She knows the chances of success under ideal circumstances, has them burned into backs of her eyelids, the numbers she sees every time she closes her eyes.

And these are far less than ideal circumstances.

Still, even if everything does go wrong, maybe she can at least take out that bastard Killian with the blast.

She manages to make her fingers move enough to grab the injector, clenches them, driving the head into her palm as she presses the trigger.

She has just about enough time to hope that her neighbour will take good care of Charles, her cat, before the pain begins in earnest.

And this is a far, far worse pain than the one she was suffering before.

 

(One day, one day she will know that there is *always* a worse pain, no matter how bad the last one was.)

(And she will learn there are things that can make it easier to tolerate, too.)

 

There's no one around when she finally becomes aware of her surroundings again.

Just bodies and bullet holes and rubble.

But the lack of pain is enough to make her sob by itself.

Not for long, though.

She can't afford to stick around.

The police will surely be here any moment, or, worse, more of Killian's men.

She has to get out of here.

She has to do it now.

 

(One day, she will realise that, even for her, the lab can feel too confining, too restrictive.)

 

The pain is gone by the time she reaches her apartment.

It's so gone, in fact, that it has been replaced by euphoria.

She's aware of the common psychological side effects - the over-confidence, the lack of empathy, the sheer addictiveness of it all.

Knowledge is different from experience, though.

Charles doesn't survive the move.

Something about her - maybe her smell, maybe the ease with which she catches him, maybe even just a bad fur day - triggers him, and he lashes out at her, scratching a long slice down one arm.

The heat produced burns him badly before she has a chance to drop him.

After that, well, she does the kindest thing she can.

And the noise was starting to attract attention too.

She backs the things she needs - including the supply of ready cash that she's taken to storing behind the back of a cabinet, just in case - and flees.

The town, the county, the state.

After hearing about the showdown between Killian and Iron Man on the news, she considers fleeing the country.

But no one seems to be looking for her.

Maybe they think she's dead, or just aren't bothered with catching her.

So she decides to stick around.

Maybe get back into science at a lowish level, work her way up.

There's still Extremis to perfect, after all.

A Nobel Prize to win, a world of suffering to heal.

A chance to prove everyone who turned her down wrong.

 

(One day, she will approach Natasha and ask her if she could train for fieldwork.)

(Natasha will look at her for a long moment, then say that she'll see what she can do.)

(Shortly after that, lessons will start.)

(Giving her a chance to prove herself, that she can do more good out in the field. Rapid response science.)

 

A month later, and she finds herself in the lab of an old colleague, an old friend down near San Diego.

Withdrawal from Extremis has started to kick in.

Like she'd known it would, of course.

But it's far, far worse than she had imagined.

The loss of her enhanced abilities, the things that have kept her safe, the loss of her near immortality.

The loss of her near constant euphoria.

Without it, the world just seems to cut her at every turn, a rough breeze seeming to abrade her just with a touch.

No sleep, of course - the bed sheets are far too rough against her sensitised skin.

So, even knowing the risk, even knowing that there is a chance for a critical cascade every time she injects, she has to have more.

The catch being, of course, that even if there is any left, it's safely under lock and key with some agency or another.

But she had the knowledge of how to make more inside her head.

Now all she needs is the equipment.

Which is why she's here, in the middle of the night, at Professor Wilkins' lab.

The wrinkle in the plan being that there's somebody already here.

She almost turns away.

Almost.

But the need drives her on.

It's Professor Wilkins, bent over the lab bench, working on something.

She must make a noise or something as she enters, because he turns around, his face lighting up as he sees her. "Dr Hansen," he says, "Maya. How delightful to see you."

He knows.

She can't put her finger on exactly how she knows this, but she does.

He *knows*.

She could still back out, probably get away before he calls the police.

But she really needs some more Extremis.

She really does.

And it would be so easy...

So she keeps a pleasant expression on her face as she advances towards him. "How have you been?" she asks. "What have you been working on?"

He's so distractible by that question - he always has been, so interested in what he's working on that he's never even shown more than a cursory interest in anything she's ever done - that he's barely started the ramble when she's standing in front of him.

And from there...

And from there, it's not very difficult at all to just reach out and twist his head all the way around with her enhanced strength.

"Sorry," she tells his corpse, before she starts work, using the machinery in the room.

She's only got scant hours to work before someone else arrives.

And now that she's taken this step, she owes it Professor Wilkins to make sure his sacrifice was worthwhile.

 

(One day, she will kill again. It won't be an accident that time, either.)

(Guards will rush in, overwhelming the field agents assigned to protect her, as she tries to eliminate the bacterial containers safely before the contents can be spread into the atmosphere.)

(Her training, Natasha's training, will come to the fore, and she'll coolly gun down the remaining enemies before their bullets can breach containment.)

 

Later, when she's out of the city, in the middle of nowhere, she pulls the car over, retrieves the injector from her handbag and looks at it for a moment.

She knows the risks, that surviving the first treatment only decreases the risk for subsequent injections, never eliminates it.

That it's nothing to do with who strong you are, or whatever line of nonsense Killian sold the test subjects (and himself).

That the safest thing she could is throw the injector away, and return to life without Extremis.

Somehow.

And after that moment, she injects herself anyway.

 

(One day, in the aftermath of that incident, after the debrief, her hands will start to shake.)

(She will realise what she has done, and collapse in her room.)

(Not crying, not allowing herself to cry.)

(But destroyed, nonetheless.)

 

It's about a week after that, in another state, in another part of the country, just as she's exiting her motel room, that it happens.

She pays little attention to the woman walking past her - she's attractive, but no threat goes Maya's thought.

(And one day, she'll find this memory tremendously amusing.)

Then there's a sharp pain in the back of her neck, just over her spine, and suddenly all the strength leaves her body.

She has just enough time to think 'Extremis should protect me from any kind of drug' before everything goes black.

 

(One day, Natasha will find her there, bearing alcohol.)

(She will offer what comfort she can.)

(Both through the alcohol and, later, in bed.)

(There will be, after all, no one who knows her quite as well as Natasha.)

(And, afterwards, she will go out into the field again.)

(And this time she will do better.)

 

She wakes up.

The Extremis is gone from her system, and everything hurts and everything is cold.

She's on a hard bed, with what feels like sandpaper for clothing, grating all over her body.

The Extremis is gone from her system, and she's never felt more vulnerable and more helpless.

The walls of the room are metal, with a faint thrum running through them.

The Extremis is gone from her system, and, god, she needs it, how she needs it.

There's no window, no source of light other than an electric light recessed into the ceiling.

No other features at all, apart from a toilet, a washbasin and a solid metal door.

She's in a box, in a coffin, and she needs out, she needs out *now*.

Or, really, what she *really* needs right now is an ampoule of Extremis and an injector.

 

She doesn't get out and she doesn't get the Extremis either.

 

In fact, she goes a little mad for a while.

There are... blank patches in her memory.

But, afterwards, she has faint recollection at scratching at the door, the walls, herself.

She even thinks that she might have tried to kill herself once.

Maybe twice.

But the only thing that she has firm memories of is the dull routine.

Lights go on.

Lights go off.

Food and water appear.

The empty containers disappear.

Occasionally, she thinks that a grill in the door opens, and she gets to talk to someone. Male, female, it varies, but they all blur into one.

Assuming that she's talking to anyone outside her head at all.

Slowly, slowly it gets better.

The symptoms - the chill, the oversensitivity, the feeling that her body is just *wrong* - fade.

And she does talk to people.

She does.

Whenever she wants to.

Even if they will only talk about certain subjects.

Even if they won't tell her where she is or who is holding her.

Even if they never even enter the room while she's conscious.

 

(One day, one far distant day, she will get to work on Extremis again.)

(Tony solved the cascade problem for Pepper, years ago.)

(The fly in the ointment will be that, like with many things that Tony does, the solution is a one shot.)

(Customised to Pepper's physiology, useful for no-one else.)

(And she will wonder - Am I ready yet? Will I ever be ready?)

 

Until, one day, the door does slide open and a woman - the woman from outside the motel - enters the room.

Black clothes, loose red hair and a completely neutral expression.

"Maya Hansen," she says and sits down on the bed beside Maya.

"Who are you? Who's holding me?" Maya asks, but she isn't really expecting much more than the nothing she's received before.

"I'm Natasha. And this is a SHIELD facility."

Oh.

It's actually something of a comforting response. SHIELD is something of a known quantity - Killian dealt with them as a contractor.

On one hand, they're not exactly big on any kind of due process. If she had entertained any thought of asking for a lawyer, it's quickly discarded now.

On the other hand, they do have their own research division. And Extremis is right up their alley.

Just the thought of it is still tantalising, dangerous.

She's not sure that she'd trust herself around it just yet.

But the chance to fulfil the old dream...

If she can just persuade them that she can still be useful.

Careful, Maya, she cautions herself. You're not out of the woods just yet.

And SHIELD does have a mandate to utilise enhanced interrogation, should it see fit.

In the face of that thought, it's not hard to project nervousness.

"Are you here to," her voice breaks and she swallows before continuing, "Debrief me?"

Natasha gives her a slight smile in response. Even after everything, Maya finds it comforting.

"I'm just here to talk to you, find out your side of the story."

So Maya talks.

She tells her about she developed Extremis, about how world changing it could be.

About the years she spent developing it until the grant money ran out.

About how she wouldn't let the dream die, how much time she spent trying to get more money behind her.

How it was all in vain until Killian believed enough in her to give her funding.

That they thought that they'd ironed out the wrinkles enough for human testing.

That they'd been wrong about how ready Extremis was, in some regards. 

But that in others, it had performed better than their wildest dreams.

But everyone who had taken it had been a volunteer, had known the risks.

"But it's *still* perfectible," she says, finishing. "It can still do *so* much good in the world. If you only let me do what I can to complete it."

Especially if Tony had managed to figure out how to perfect the process for Pepper.

"Thank you," Natasha says. "I'll make sure that my superiors take that under consideration."

She smiles, stands and exits the room.

 

(One day, she will seek Natasha out, and ask her what she thinks.)

(They will still be having a thing, an occasional thing, as and when their timetables match.)

(Natasha will look deep into her eyes, and say 'I trust you'.)

(Maya will let out a shaky breath, and nod, saying, 'And I trust you' back.)

(It will be the closest to an 'I love you' either of them will ever say.)

(And Maya will take the project, but run it the right way this time.)

(The result will be less powerful.)

(The healing less rapid, less absolute.)

(And no heat effect, for good or ill.)

(Despite the fact that it will become standard issue for all SHIELD agents, she never will use it.)

 

Natasha returns later.

Maya would say that it is the next day, but without a clock or view of the outside, time is starting to lose its meaning for her.

She has slept and eaten since the last visit, which is as good a measure as any.

So, yes, Natasha returns the next day.

"Congratulations," she says as she opens the door, smiling.

Maya's heart leaps. "You've decided to put me to use?"

"Follow me," she says, and walks back out of the room.

Maya pauses for a moment, not quite able to believe that she's finally getting to leave her, then hurries after Natasha. 

Her legs are a little stiff with disuse, and it takes her a moment to even just focus all the way down the other end of the corridor.

But it doesn't matter, because she doesn't need to use her eyes to see into the future.

A future where she's vindicated, where all the problems, all the waiting, all the suffering were worthwhile.

In fact, when it comes down to it, the only thing stopping her from skipping down the corridor is how difficult it is to move.

"Thank you," she says to Natasha. "Thank you for giving me this chance."

"Don't thank me yet," she says drily. "SHIELD doesn't believe in being soft."

All the corridors we pass through are metal, all with metal doors lining them, all buzzing with the hum that seemingly fills the place.

People, all in the SHIELD uniform, pass them.

Each time, their eyes flicker to Natasha, and over Maya as though she isn't there.

But it's a start, and Maya can work with this, work upwards.

It's only a matter of time.

She's a little tired by the time Natasha stops outside a door, identical to the rest.

And this too will change, with a little regular exercise.

"Through here," Natasha says, and presses a control next to the door.

Maya bustles forward, eager to see the lab that she's going to be practically calling home for the next however long...

To be greeted by an almost identical cell. The only difference is that in this one there is a table with two chairs in the middle. Several folders are stacked on the table.

"What..?" she asks.

A firm hand propels her inside, and she hears the door close behind them.

"Did you really think that we were going to trust you, just like that?" Natasha says in a chill voice, as she strides past her. "Sit down," she commands as she takes one chair.

"I thought... you implied that... What more do you want to know?" Maya protests. "I've told you everything."

Natasha gives her a look of cold dislike. "Sit," she says in a tone that promises if Maya doesn't, she won't be given an option.

Maya sits.

Natasha opens the first folder.

The picture on the top is of a young woman in fatigues, ruddy skin, sandy blonde hair. She doesn't seem at all familiar.

"This is Private Sharon Young," Natasha says. "She enlisted in the Army in 2010, served in Afghanistan and was planning on using the GI Bill to study human biology. By all accounts she was an exceptionally bright student, expected to do very well." She flips the picture to reveal another one underneath. A blast zone, with a charred corpse, unrecognisable. "She didn't get a chance. She was killed when one of your subjects went critical. She left behind a mother and two brothers, who she was helping to support." Natasha bares her teeth at me. "They're probably going hungry tonight, thanks to you."

"We didn't know that critical cascades could happen, past the first injection," Maya protests. "Once we did..."

"Once you did, you did nothing," Natasha snaps. "Apart from create a story that had everyone running around, looking at everything *apart* from your test subjects."

"That was Killian. He said that if the DOD found out, they'd yank our funding, even prosecute us. And then we'd never get a chance to fix the problem, make everything right."

She just looks flatly at me for a moment, before revealing the next picture. 

It's an older man, dark hair, tanned skin.

"Another one of your victims," she says, before continuing to tell me about him, the people who knew him, and the effects that had rippled out from his death.

And another picture.

And another one.

Men, women, children.

And with every picture, it becomes harder to maintain the excuses.

Maya may not have killed anyone, but she'd been complicit, had helped Killian, stood by as he'd moulded the vulnerable test subjects into his private army.

Watched as he'd gone more and more off the rails after he'd taken Extremis himself.

And done nothing to object. Nothing to stop him.

"What's your excuse here?" Natasha asks as she shows Maya a picture of Professor Wilkins. "Are you going to blame Killian for his death too?"

There's still a part of her that answers yes. If he hadn't shot her, hadn't forced her to take Extremis, then...

But it's not enough, now, to even answer, to do anything apart from hunch her shoulders further.

Not even enough to wipe away the tears streaming down her face.

"Look at me," Natasha commands, as she always does when Maya even looks like she might be trying to hide her face. "Look at them. Surely you owe them that much."

And on and on it goes.

Past horror.

Past pain.

Past any shred of denial for her part in all of this.

Her fault.

It's all her fault.

At some point Natasha stops, and leaves.

But it doesn't matter, because the pictures and the stories keep playing through Maya's mind, regardless.

 

(One day, Natasha will come into her room, and will sit rigidly in the chair, saying nothing at all.)

(It will take Maya a little time to find out that Clint is dead.)

(It won't be a complete surprise - if Maya will learn anything on field missions, it will be that every agent dies in the field, if they stay out long enough...)

(But it will hit her like a fist to the stomach, regardless.)

 

Time passes.

Lights go on.

Lights go off.

Food and water appear.

The empty containers disappear.

Sometimes people stop by.

Sometimes she even thinks Natasha stops by.

It doesn't matter.

She doesn't want to talk.

She's worthless.

She...

It's all her fault.

It's all her fault.

 

Clint may have been killed on a separate mission in another country, but Natasha will blame herself regardless.)

(Maya will hold Natasha through the night, and, in the morning, Natasha will still be there.)

(She still won't have said a word, but that won't matter too much.)

(Because there will never be anyone who understands Natasha quite like Maya.)

 

Slowly, slowly, the silence, the inaction gets to her.

Maya, despite her flaws, despite her *many* flaws, has always been in motion.

Moving towards something, even if it seems that she'll never get there.

Doing nothing can only last so long.

 

(One day afterwards, Maya will find that Natasha and she seem to be assigned to more and more of the same missions.)

(Not every mission - Natasha will still spend a lot more time in the field than she ever will - but enough.)

(It will be a message, but not one either of them will ever say out loud.)

 

She knocks on her door.

A few minutes later, the grille slides open to reveal the face of an unfamiliar man.

She tries to speak, but her voice doesn't want to work after keeping silent for so long.

She swallows, tries again.

"I want to talk to someone," she manages slowly, haltingly.

The grille slides shut.

She settles down to wait.

And maybe practice using her voice again.

 

(One day, Maya will find, to her great amusement, that she has acquired a nickname of her own, to go along with Natasha's.)

(It will be the Iron Lady, a reference to the whitening of her hair as much as the fact that she will be the terror of labs and field teams alike.)

(Natasha will already know, of course, but Maya will tell her anyway.)

(And Natasha will give her an amused smile, and will run a hand through those greying locks.)

(And it will be a thing, another strand binding them together.)

 

A while later, the door slides open to reveal Natasha, who looks at her in the same cold manner she remembers from her dreams, her nightmares.

"What do you want?" she asks.

"I want to help," Maya replies. "Somehow. Doing something. I have to be able to help somehow."

Natasha's expression eases, settles somewhere in the location of unreadable. "Why?" she asks simply.

"Because you're right. Because I've caused so much death, so much suffering. I have try and do something to balance it. Please."

Natasha nods, slowly. "I'll see what can be done." She gives Maya a small smile, the first one since she sprang her little trap. "No promises."

"I'll try not to hope," Maya tells her.

She does anyway.

 

(One day, Maya will wake up to Natasha lying next to her.)

(And she will realise that she can't remember the last time that they didn't share a bed when they were both in the same place.)

(And that Natasha will somehow manage to make sure that their schedules coincide an inordinate amount of the time.)

 

It's a while later when Natasha comes back in, carrying some neatly folded clothes.

"Put these on," she says, and stands there, watching dispassionately, as Maya does so.

"I will show you to the lab. You will be working under Dr Djerbib. You will do everything she says. You will not leave the lab, unless accompanied. If you do anything, *anything*, judged even faintly suspicious, for whatever reason, this privilege will end. Do you understand?"

Maya nods.

"Good. Follow me."

This time, there isn't any hope pushing her forwards.

Just grim determination.

She can't change what she's done.

She can't bring back anyone who's died.

She can only try her best, in whatever way she can, to make the future better.

This time, she can only feel grateful when the eyes of the people they see skip over her.

It's really the best she can hope for.

Still, she can't help feeling trepidation when Natasha stops in front of a door.

It's ridiculous.

Whatever is waiting there, it can't be worse than she deserves.

Still...

Something unclenches inside of her when she sees it's a small, modestly appointed lab, with a dusky skinned woman in a lab coat bustling around inside of it.

The woman looks over at the door. "You are the new lab tech?" she asks Maya in an accented voice.

Laboratory technician. Maya can remember a time when she would have taken that title as an insult.

Now... now at least it's something.

Maya nods. "Yes."

"What's your name?"

"Maya," she replies, feeling almost shy to reveal this much of herself. "Maya Hansen."

"I hope you have more experience than the last idiot they assigned me," Dr Djerbib grumbles.

When Maya looks around, Natasha has disappeared.

For a moment, she feels tense again. But when the good doctor points her towards a folder of protocols that she wants her to learn, the feeling subsides.

This, at least, she can do.

And frankly, at the moment, the lack of responsibility seems like more of a blessing than a curse.

 

(One day, Maya will face her worst fear, her worst temptation.)

(There always will be, and always have been, less than ethical projects occurring under the auspices of SHIELD.)

(Always for the best of reasons.)

(Always for the best of intentions.)

(To that point, Maya will have managed to steer clear of them.)

(But her history, her past project, will always haunt her.)

(Until one day, a superior from the WSC, will ask her to head one of them.)

 

Slowly, things get better.

The research is nothing to do with her field, of course, but it's interesting enough.

She's provided with enough research papers to get her up to scratch, even if she doesn't have any access to the computer network.

It takes a few months, but when Maya comes in one morning, Dr Djerbib - Nadia - waves her over.

"It's about time you started pulling your own weight around here," she tells Maya brusquely. "I want you to investigate these avenues for me."

It's a project of her own.

A small project.

But still....

For a moment, Maya can't breathe.

And then the world slowly fades back into view.

"Okay," she says. "Okay."

"Good," Nadia says, waving a finger in her face. "It's about time you stopped relying on me looking over your shoulder."

 

(He will know just what to say, just how to tempt her, just what to do to put a veneer of authenticity on it.)

(And she will know that is a project for the greater good, that, if successful, it will help protect Earth.)

(For a moment, she won't be able to breathe.

(And the words of acceptance will almost force their way out of her throat.)

(Almost.)

(Instead, that night, she will find Natasha, and, though she will not say a thing about the project, though the only thing she will do is to make love with more passion, more energy, than she has shown for many months, the message will be received.)

(And, tomorrow, the WSC representative will find someone else to run that project instead.)

(And Maya will unclench slowly inside, with the knowledge that this, at least, is one test she will have passed.)

 

A few weeks after that, she finds that she's been allotted another room to sleep in, one closer to a place where someone might actually stay than a prison cell.

Still, it takes another month before she isn't escorted everywhere, even if she is confined to a few scant levels.

She doesn't try and push, doesn't take undue advantage of this new freedom.

She's still always aware that she's under the sword of Damocles, like unseen watchers are waiting for her slightest deviation from her limits.

The projects get more and more complicated. Still unrelated to Extremis, for which she is grateful, but they've started bordering on regions that take advantage of her in-depth knowledge of that area.

She still sometimes wakes with cravings to feel that power again, that euphoria.

She hasn't recovered.

She may never do so totally.

Every time that her research even touches it, however tangentially, she feels like she's on a precipice.

It's an on-going battle.

But one that, so far, she's winning.

So far, she's maintaining her grip on that cliff.

It's about nine months before she's allowed internet access. 

A year before the access isn't obviously and strictly monitored.

It takes her a few months after that to muster up the nerve to start looking up her victims, to find out how they and their families are doing.

Every new horror makes her twitch, but she doesn't allow herself the luxury of crying.

She doesn't have that right.

It takes a few weeks of planning, of budgeting, but she finally accesses the secret accounts of Killian that she knows about.

The ones she told no-one else about, not even Natasha.

She sets up foundations, charities, trusts for everyone she can, spending and spreading the money as efficiently as she can.

And when the last dollar, the last cent has been spent, she can't help but feel a certain release of tension.

She doesn't deserve to, but she does anyway.

It's over.

She's finally managed to out this plan into action, over a year after she first conceived of it.

Natasha has visited every now and again, every week or two. 

Mostly she just observes, not saying a thing.

From which Maya deduces that she must be performing... adequately.

She thinks that, in Natasha's eyes, that's the most she can hope for.

In her own too.

Still, she isn't entirely surprised when, the next day, Natasha comes by after she's finished the work day and, after silently observing her eating dinner in her room for a while, speaks.

"This doesn't make you even, you understand," she says. "You haven't balanced out your ledger."

Maya blinks, but doesn't pretend to not understand where Natasha is coming from. "No," she agrees. "I just... had to do something."

Natasha looks at her with unfathomable eyes for long seconds, then says, "Come with me," and turns towards the exit.

For a moment, Maya can't think anything but the worst.

That she's overstepped herself, that's she's going to be locked back up in that room, and the key thrown away.

No, she wants to say, I'm doing good here. I'm doing *something*.

Please, let me keep doing *something*.

Then she slumps. If that is what the price is for helping, in whatever meagre way she can, the people she hurt, then so be it.

Doing that had been worth the cost.

Natasha, waiting in the doorway, has turned back towards her. After Maya slumps, she smiles slightly. "It's a good thing, I promise."

Maya, curiosity piques, stands and dares to actually smile back at her, and isn't slapped down.

Together, they go towards the lift.

Natasha presses the button for the top floor - a place Maya has yet to be - and, with a whisk, they are away.

The lift opens up onto what looks remarkably like the deck of an aircraft carrier.

If said aircraft carrier were floating in the clouds.

The constant thrumming, that Maya has grown so used to she never even hears anymore, is explained.

But, more than this, more than the wonder of being on a flying boat, is the simple joy of being underneath the open sky again, after over a year shut away.

The breeze plays across Maya's face, and it feels like she can *breathe* again.

It's night time, and the stars sparkle above them.

"Thank you," she says, breathlessly. "*Thank you*."

Natasha pauses for a second, then says, "It's never over, you know. You can never escape the weight of the things you've done." She doesn't say, 'You can never let yourself escape that weight' but Maya hears it anyway.

And also...

And also, she can't help hearing Natasha saying 'I' as much as 'you'.

And as she meets Natasha's gaze, she knows that this, too, was intentional.

"Thank you," she says again, but this time for a different reason.

Natasha doesn't reply, and Maya doesn't feel the need to say anything.

Together, they look upwards as the sky slowly brightens, and the stars slowly fade.

 

(One day, Maya will find herself on Orbital 12.)

(The place that SHIELD will use for work too risky to do on Earth.)

(She will be running the project, on an alien biological artefact.)

(Despite all her best precautions, things will go bad.)

(Lives will be lost.)

(And, at the last, Maya will stay behind to set the self-destruct whilst the remnants of her team make it off station.)

(They will stay in the shuttle for as long as they can, waiting for the Iron Lady to make her way to them.)

(But, in the end, she will order them to cast off, before they too are lost.)

(She will manage to make it to the airlock regardless, before the station blows, just in time to see them start re-entry.)

(There will be a chance, a slim one, but a chance nonetheless.)

(And she will take it.)

(She will make it outside, in a spacesuit.)

(Be knocked away, the universe spinning crazily, by the explosion.)

(And there might well have been time to send a transport to rescue her.)

(If not for the fact that she will be pushed towards the planet beneath.)

(Before she begins re-entry, she will have time to send a message.)

(She will think about telling Natasha that she loves her.)

(But they will never have used those words, and she will not be able to start now.)

(Instead, she will tell them to tell Natasha that she said 'Thank you.')

(She will not say 'Thank you for a richer, fuller life than I could have imagined. A life worth living.')

(She will not say 'Thank you for believing in me enough to give me a second chance, a proper second chance.')

(She will not say 'Thank you for being my soul mate, my resting place and my anchor.')

(Because those will be the words that they will never say out loud.)

(And she will have to trust that Natasha will understand what they meant.)

(The only thing she will be surprised at, if only a little, is that she will be dying first.)

(Because, as she will learn, every agent dies in the field, if they stay out long enough.)

(And, she may not have balanced her ledger, but she will have had a damned good try.)

(As she begins her descent, the sun will start peeking around the corner of the planet.)

(And, as the air starts to ignite around her, the sky will slowly brighten, and the stars will slowly fade.)


End file.
